Every day but Sunday he dresses in the uniformofhis formerprofession:khaki-coloredworkclothes,steel-toed brogans,athinwindbreakerzippedtotheAdam’sappleifthere isashadowysweetnessinthemorningbreeze.Herisesbefore dawn, lights the pilot of the kerosene stove, lets thedogsout, careful not to slap the screen door. He sits at thekitchentable drinking instant coffee, black, for an hour until hiswiferises andfriesbreakfastwordlesslyinherhousecoat.Neitherofhis sons wanted to take over the farm and his daughtermovedup toRaleightoworkinabankandhedoesn’tunderstandagood three-quarters of the things he hears peoplesay.Commercials on television perplex him. There doesn’t seem to beanylogic to them, they begin in the middle and it’s never quiteclear to him what it is they’re even advertising. He stands inthebackyard looking out over the fields he leases now to anoutfitout of,byGod,Delaware,workingapickbetweenhisteeth,dogs at his feet. Maybe I have outlived time. Soon there willbeno suchthingasdew,thethingheoncehadtorousehimselfearly frombedtobeat.Getitdonebeforethesunburnsthedewoff. They’ll do away with that, too. In the war he had beenwalkingthroughaFrenchforestpretendinghewasbackhomequail huntinginBeamon’swoodswithhiscousinswhenhetooktwo bullets:onethroughthepalmofhishand,anotherintheshoulder,shatteringhisclavicle.TheGermanspinnedthemdownat the edge of a field for sixteen hours. Mortar rounds exploded thetreesabovehim,turningtreelimbsintotiny,deadlyslivers. Itgrewdarkandsocoldhebitawadded-upsleevetoquietthe chatter of his teeth. He lay there hoping he would freeze to death before he bled out because he had heard a frozen man justfellfinallyasleep.Butsomeoldboycamealong,pickedhim upandslunghimoverhisshoulderlikeasackoffertilizer,took himdeeperintothewoods.Helaidhimdownandstrippedoff hisclothesandboundhiswoundswithtourniquetsandfetched from somewhere a medic who told him they couldn’t risk the lightneededtocleanhiswoundsbuthehadachoicebetween ashotofmorphineandashotofScotch.Hesaidhe’dtakethe morphine and ten minutes later the same medic came back as ifhe’dnotbeentherebeforeandaskedhimthesamequestion andhesaidhe’dtaketheScotch.Bythattimetheoldboywho’d hauled him back from where he lay dying had taken his own clothes off and zipped two bags together and, because of the heatcomingoffthatboy’sbody,herehewas,ponderingthedisappearanceofdew.He’donlybeenwithhiswife,onewomanin seventyyears,andallhehadtocomparethefeelofherbodyto onamorningwhenthewindowswerefrostyandtheradiators clankedonwasthatboy,whowasbigbutallmuscleandhairy. It felt like a sin to still retain the memory of the roughness of theboy’scheekwheninthenightitgrazedthebackofhisneck butthiswasn’ttheworstthing,norwasgettingshotatandlying alone in the cold and dark trying to choose which way to die. AfterhespentsixweeksrecuperatinginEngland,theysenthim toapsychiatristandthepsychiatristaskedhimwashescaredto returnandhesaidhellyesI’mscared,wouldn’tyoube?Thepsychiatristshruggedandsaidtothesergeantwho’dbroughthim overthere,Nothingwrongwiththisone,sendhimback.Later, bythetimehegotbackacrossthewatertoFrance,Hitlerwas dead.Hefiguredthewholethingwasoverandhecouldgoon homebuttheysenthimtosupervisethePOWswhosejobitwas to clean up Dachau. He saw a lot of things during that detail he’djustassoonforget,worsethingsthanwhenhewasgetting shot at, but it wasn’t what they hauled out of there that got to him.Forweeksafterthey’dliberatedtheplace,menandwomen werecampedoutsidethegates.Roma,someonetoldhimthey were called when he asked what they were doing there still. Gypsies. They ain’t got no home. Here’s as good as anyplace tothem.Everymorninghiscaptainwouldcomealongwithan interpreterandtellthesepeopletheywerefreetoleave,butthe nextmorningtherethey’dbe,sittingaroundafire,dirty,skinny assaplings, eating the C rations they gave them.

When the sun has burned off the dew, he climbs into his pickupandmotors,slowasacombine,thehalfmiledowntothe Stop’n’Go.Heknowsitisjustspitethatkeepshimfromclimbing out of second gear, spite for the traffic bottling upbehind, all in a hurry, eager to get to that someplace, he doesn’t know whereorcare,somebodytoldthemtheyneededtobe.

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This story originally appeared in New England Review. See the rest of the 2018 O. Henry Prize stories here.

Michael Parker is the author of six novels—Hello Down There, Towns Without Rivers, Virginia Lovers, If You Want Me To Stay, The Watery Part of the World, All I Have In This World—and two collections of stories, The Geographical Cure and Don’t Make Me Stop Now.